Joe Girardi Wants MLB to Ban Defensive Shifts

I’ve been watching David Ortiz smoke balls right into the teeth of the shift for over ten years. It sucks. I know you all know how I feel, because since shifts have become so commonplace, at least one person on your team gets heavily shifted against. It’s unbelievably frustrating, yet I’ve accepted it as part of the game. New York Yankees manager Joe Girardi says he would ban defensive shifts if he were commissioner.

The Yankees just so happen to be the team who suffers the most from defensive shifts. So instead of having his players adapt, Girardi would rather the league just ban shifts altogether. First off, how Yankee of a mindset is that? “Shifts hurt us so let’s just get rid of them!”

When the curveball first arose, it was made illegal because it made hitting much more difficult for players. Eventually, the players adapted and the curveball is one of the most important pitches in the game today. As much as I hate seeing someone hit directly into a shift, there’s now way they should be banned. It’s unbelievably satisfying when a player goes with the pitch and hits the ball right where a fielder should be, and I don’t want to lose that aspect of hitting.

Here are some of the crazy shifts you could see on a nightly basis.

(By the way, shifting has been a part of the game for a long time. Here’s the Cardinals shifting against Ted Williams in the 1946 World Series)

Should the MLB ban defensive shifts in baseball altogether? What are your thoughts?

20 years old. Unhealthily passionate about baseball and the Boston Red Sox. When I was 10, I beat the single season home run record in one summer. Granted, I was playing wiffle ball in the back yard with my brother, but hey.